Description

Shadow Warrior is a reboot of the 1997 first-person shooter Shadow Warrior. The player controls the ninja mercenary Lo Wang who is hired by Zilla Enterprise to buy the katana Nobitsura Kage for 2 million dollars. When the deal goes awry Wang is captured. After he manages to escape he bonds with the spirit Hoji who also holds an interest in the katana. The game is then divided into different chapters where Wang chases after the katana. The game uses an Asian setting in a modern day environment.

Wang's main weapon is his katana used for close melee combat. It slices quickly controlled through mouse movement and there are different types of (charged) strikes and skills to provide variation. The other weapons offer ranged attacks: a pistol, a machine gun, a shotgun, a crossbow, a rocket launcher, the excalibat from Rise of the Triad etc. When using the katana shuriken can be thrown quickly. Upgrades are provided in three categories (Weapons, Skills and Powers) each with their own currency (money, karma and KI crystals respectively) and with different tiers. Most skills are performed through key combinations combined with the mouse. They offer new ways to attack, but can also used to heal Wang. Levels are generally linear, but there are a few alternative routes and many secrets. Boss fights often take place in large arenas.

Next to the main campaign mode with different difficulty levels two additional modes become available after completing the game. In Ex mode the game is played from the beginning once more but with all the upgrades from the previous run. In Heroic mode there are no automatic saves or checkpoints; saving is only done between missions. A later update added a fourth mode called Survival where Wang fights waves of enemies on three maps.

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Trivia

Hidden references to the original game

Multiple secret areas in the game transition seamlessly into environments that look rendered by the Build engine of the original game. There is an example in the screenshots section.

Each chapter except for the last one contains a pixelated anime girl bathing, the same way they are rendered in the original game. There is an audio clue to locate them as you hear them sing when you get near.

References to other games

Multiple game arcade machines can be found in the levels. They are not playable, but show the games Hard Reset, Hotline Miami and Serious Sam. The first was also made by the developer. The other two were also published by Devolver Digital. When you activate them, a music track from the game starts playing. There are posters of those games as well at various locations and an arcade machine of the original Shadow Warrior.

Viscera Cleanup Detail: Shadow Warrior

The digital version of the game comes with Viscera Cleanup Detail: Shadow Warrior, a free mini-game spun off from Viscera Cleanup Detail where the player needs to clean up rooms of one of the main game's opening levels. The mini-game is a separate application developed by RuneStorm and it uses a separate engine: UnrealEngine3.